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To Have and to Hold: An Intimate History Of Collectors and Collecting
To Have and to Hold: An Intimate History Of Collectors and Collecting
To Have and to Hold: An Intimate History Of Collectors and Collecting
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To Have and to Hold: An Intimate History Of Collectors and Collecting

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“This curiously moving history . . . traces the development of collections since the Renaissance through lively portraits of famous collectors.” —The New Yorker
 
From amassing sacred relics to collecting celebrity memorabilia, the impulse to hoard has gripped humankind throughout the centuries. But what is it that drives people to possess objects that have no conceivable use? To Have and To Hold is a captivating tour of collectors and their treasures from medieval times to the present, from a cabinet containing unicorn horns and a Tsar's collection of teeth to the macabre art of embalmer Dr. Frederick Ruysch, the fabled castle of William Randolph Hearst, and the truly preoccupied men who stockpile food wrappers and plastic cups. An engrossing story of the collector as bridegroom, deliriously, obsessively happy, wed to his possessions, till death do us part.
 
“Wry history . . . Blom’s formidable research is an example of the collector’s art in itself.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
“An admirable attempt to chart the history of an obsession.” —Publishers Weekly
 
“An impressive, wide-ranging book.” —Christopher Tayler, Sunday Telegraph
 
“Blom's literary cabinet is full of pungent biographies.” —Times Literary Supplement
 
“Provocative, stimulating and entertaining . . . Huge questions are thrown up . . . on every page of the book, but it is also full of jokes, unusual and very welcome in a work of such impressive scholarship and elegance of style . . . a sparkling, discursive, and eclectic book.” —Independent on Sunday
 
“Throughout these well-documented stories, Blom probes the heart and soul of collecting's appeal . . . .An intellectual journey worth taking.” —Booklist
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJun 1, 2004
ISBN9781468302189
To Have and to Hold: An Intimate History Of Collectors and Collecting
Author

Philipp Blom

Philipp Blom was born in 1970 in Hamburg and grew up in Detmold, in Germany. After university studies in Vienna and Oxford, he obtained a D.Phil in Modern History. He started writing at Oxford and published a novel as well as occasional journalism, moving on to London, where he worked as an editor, translator, writer and freelance journalist, contributing to newspapers, magazines and radio programmes in Great Britain, the US, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, and France. In 2001, Philipp Blom moved to Paris to concentrate on his books. In 2007 he settled in Vienna, where he continues to write nonfiction, such as Nature's Mutiny, as well as fiction, films, and occasional journalism. He presents a cultural discussion programme on Austrian national radio and has lectured on history, philosophy, and cultural history in Europe, the US, and South America. He is married to Veronica Buckley, who is also a writer.

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Rating: 3.871428665714286 out of 5 stars
4/5

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Very erudite, great writer this Phillip Blom ! Recommend reading his other books too!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A very enjoyable read. I liked the fact that Blom wrote some about the psychology of collecting as well as the history of curious collectors. Recommended.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book is about the madness and obsession of collecting possessions, objects, items, treasures and peculiar things through the ages. The key question is what drives seemingly sane individuals to collect and amass things, often objects of little use. The author ranges widely through time, past and present to find out about quirky people and their even odder collections from books, to strange creatures from Egyptian mummies to skulls and plaster casts, form milk bottles to advertising labels. The most successful of collectors were those who wrote about their collections or created museums that preserved the collection beyond their lifespans . One of my favourite London museums is the Lincoln's Inn Field Sir John Soane museum. The book is well researched, with many interesting facets to collecting explored. Ultimately the purpose of collecting is driven by a desire to impose order on a chaotic world and perhaps to understand the world better and secondly, to purchase longevity through collecting; if you cannot live forever at least your collection will speak in your voice for the next generation. However this is a poorly produced book as the illustrations which could have brought life and delight, are small dark and poorly reproduced miniature inserts. These do not do justice to the travels and hard workof the author.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A dense and delightful guided tour and detailed history of brilliant and obsessive collectors and their amazing collections To Have and To Hold held my attention ably. This book made me even more curious about the curious, and made me want to read more about the fascinating characters, the museums that house some of the collections, or the artifacts themselves. For anyone who loves to ponder the items in a curio cabinet or the halls of a museum or the corners of the world, this book is an absorbing diversion, and a great companion to A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes and the Eternal Passion for Books by Nicholas A. Basbanes. Each contain chapters that stand alone as fascinating vignettes, and I'm certain to browse both books again and again.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    At first I thought this was going to be a survey of some eccentric collectors in history, on which is does not disappoint, but it turns out to be a lot richer and contain some real pearls of wisdom about life in general, and flashes of historical insight. Reading through the chapters of this book was a lot like rummaging through a private collectors cabinet of curiosities. The chapter titles alone don't reveal its direction and only after a few pages does it begin to reveal its treasure. Chapters cover aspects of collecting as diverse as: people who collected experiences with women (Casanova), the collecting of body parts (religious relics), collecting memories, American billionaires who bought up European heritage (JP Morgan, Hearst), collectors of mass-produced items (milk bottles, food wrappers), Princes and Kings such as Rudolf of Hapsburg (17th C) who filled his castle with the worlds greatest collections and slowly went mad, collecting as a madness, as a substitute for love, as a form of autism, as psychology, as crime - and in the end, as a warning to all those who take it too far.Required reading for anyone who is a collector, has collected, knows a collector or is considering collecting.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Some intriguing vignettes about the gently - and not-so-gently - mad collectors.

Book preview

To Have and to Hold - Philipp Blom

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